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How DriveMyCar Is Accelerating Business And Breaking Barriers

Chris Noone has no idea where peer-to-peer technology will take Collaborate Corporation, owner of DriveMyCar. And that, he says, is a good thing.

Most businesses are advised to start life armed with a detailed business plan, mapping out growth targets, market opportunities, and pathways for growth.

In many cases, they envision an end point before they’ve even begun.

But as CEO of ASX-listed peer-to-peer technology firm Collaborate Corporation, Chris Noone knows technology now means a business plan can only take you so far. It’s customers that will define what the business eventually becomes.

“We have projections for the business and a vision of where we want to take it, but the best business you can run is one where your customers embrace the technology and services you provide, make it their own and take it forward.”

Noone says Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg or the founders of Google, for example, would never have imagined how those platforms would be embraced by users.

“You can develop a business plan to a certain point, but what we are excited about is the ability to offer the underlying tools that people and companies will then take forward and generate their own value from them.”

Collaborate is best known for its online car sharing business DriveMyCar, which allows car owners to turn their unused vehicles into revenue producing assets by renting them via an online platform. During the 2014-15 financial year, the business’ private car rental turnover was more than $1 million.

However, being a CEO in the technology world means change happens fast. Since Noone joined the group in August 2014, he has overseen a wholesale company name change, fundraisings worth almost $2 .5 million, the creation of two new peer-to-peer brands (MyCaravan and Rentoid), as well as other investments, including the new peer-to-peer SME finance start-up FundX.

DriveMyCar has also expanded further into the business market, as well as airport rentals in Sydney and Brisbane, where it is using its sharing economy DNA to unlock cost savings in new markets ripe for disruption.

Collaborate Corporation is built on the belief peer-to-peer technology creates opportunities to connect those with unused assets with those who need them.

“The elements of the sharing economy we are picking up on is the ability to monetise those underutilised assets,” Noone explains. “It makes sense to the man in the street, but also to companies and CEOs; if you have an asset that’s sitting there not being utilised, our technology can turn it into a revenue generating asset.”

The business has begun to see more widespread interest in its business model from large corporations and even government departments. “They are starting to see the benefits that the sharing economy and businesses like ours with experience in the sharing economy can add,” he says.

Noone is no stranger to the way technology can redefine business.For example, he helped Vodafone set up its mobile phone games business in Europe over a decade ago, at a time of primitive black and white screens and text-based games.

“Vodafone saw that mobile phones could become a massive gaming platform, and it was exciting to work towards that vision, and to have faith in that vision despite the detractors and to see it become the enormous industry it is today.”

Collaborate is using technology in ways that could be even more revolutionary. For example, Noone says the business has innovated by creating Peerpass, which uses ID checks, ratings and feedback to build trust in its platform.

“We see trust as critical. The more trust we can build into our platform, the more trust we can create between owners and renters, the bigger the opportunity we have. We have used the technology we have available to build in processes that means it really becomes a beneficial, safe and pleasant transaction.”

The firm has also invested heavily in trying to make the process – like listing or booking an item - as seamless as possible for its users. “The process shouldn’t be overt or all that visible to users. For customers, our technology should make it so that in a few clicks of the button everything should just happen.”

With the right back-end processes and user experience, Collaborate could be at the start of an unpredictable ride that could boost Australia’s sharing economy.

“We think technology will make it a lot easier for people to make their assets available for rental, and a much wider range of assets than cars and caravans.”

For example, Noone sees the group’s Rentoid portal becoming an ‘eBay for rentals’, where anything from a chair sitting vacant at a desk, to the vacant floor of an office building or an unused mining truck could be turned into revenue. It could end up disrupting categories from mining and construction equipment, to furniture, or entertainment-focused lighting and staging equipment.

“There are lots of different possible categories – there really is no limit. But behind them all sits a sophisticated platform,” Noone says. “We are looking to build the technology and customers can tell us how they want to use it.”

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